The invention relates to signal transduction.
The ras gene was discovered as an oncogene of the Harvey (rasH) and Kirsten (rasK) rat sarcoma viruses. In humans, characteristic mutations in the cellular ras gene (c-ras) have been associated with many different types of cancers. These mutant alleles, which render Ras constitutively active, have been shown to transform cells, such as the murine cell line NIH 3T3, in culture.
The ras gene product binds to guanine triphosphate (GTP) and guanine diphosphate (GDP) and hydrolyzes GTP to GDP. It is the GTP-bound state of Ras that is active. An accessory molecule, GTPase-activating protein (GAP) also binds to Ras and accelerates the hydrolysis of GTP. The ras proto-oncogene requires a functionally intact raf-1 proto-oncogene in order to transduce growth and differentiation signals initiated by receptor and non-receptor tyrosine kinases in higher eukaryotes. Activated Ras is necessary for the activation of the c-raf-1 proto-oncogene, but the biochemical steps through which Ras activates the Raf-1 protein (Ser/Thr) kinase are not well characterized.